Listening to God

People have told me that God has never spoken to them, though they have strained to hear Him.  We must be standing in the Presence of God to hear His voice in our hearts, and one of the very best ways to stand in the Presence of God is through a practice called "Lectio Divina."  In his simple guide to Lectio Divina, Father Luke Dysinger, a Benedictine monk, writes this:

God does not reach out and grab us but gently invites us ever more deeply into his presence.

And Catherine de Hueck Doherty puts it this way: The sea of God's mercy is warm and quiet and inviting for us to swim in (from Grace in Every Season).

I will say this:  we must be at peace, for the most part, before we can hear the voice of God.  As Elijah discovered, God is not in the whirlwind, nor in the storm, but in the "still, small voice" deep inside us.  And we know the voice is not ours because it goes against all of our own thoughts up to that moment, and it brings an end to our own foolish thoughts, replacing them with confidence and peace and assurance.

Lectio Divina is not the same as "reading Scripture."  We can read Scripture to confirm our own deeply - held beliefs and to "prove" that we are right.  That is not Lectio Divina.  In Lectio Divina, we are not trying to justify our beliefs, or to learn more, or to cover a certain amount of text.  We are seeking instead the voice of God speaking to us through the Holy Spirit.  We are seeking to enter the Presence of God.  We are seeking to swim in the warm and quiet sea of His mercy and love.

Psalm 100 says, "Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name."  Before we begin "reading Scripture," I know of no better way than thanksgiving and praise to enter into the presence of God.  True praise and thanksgiving means that we have taken the focus off our little lives and concerns and turned the spotlight on God and on His love for us, His care for us, His concern for us.  We are no longer desperate beggars standing before the closed and remote gates of a palace, but in the Presence of the One Who loves us, who has ears to hear us.  The warmth of His response begins to fill our hearts and minds and ears so that now we are ready to hear His Voice.

Only then can we open our Bibles under the direction of the Holy Spirit, who will show us what God has to say to us this day.  The Scriptures were written under the guiding hand of the Spirit, and it is that same hand that points out to us what our souls and minds and hearts are thirsting to hear today.  Without that interaction, Scripture remains a closed book to us. 

Lectio Divina is a dialog with God.  It is prayer, not "study."  It brings our thoughts and cares and wounds that need to be talked about, dealt with, into the Presence of the Only One who can heal, correct, and lighten our hearts.  Lectio Divina has no goal other than being in the Presence of God and of hearing what He has to say to us.

Richard Rohr says this:  Today the Lord will give you something new.  All you have to do is hunger, and the Lord will give you what you desire.  You have to come before the Lord expecting and wanting something more than you already have.  We get what we expect from God.  When we have new ears to hear with, the Lord can speak a new word to us.  When we no longer expect anything new or anything more from God, we are like nonbelievers, atheists for all practical purposes (from the Introduction to The Great Themes of Scripture.)

I am much afraid that my church, for the most part, is a church of nonbelievers in Rohr's definition.  We do not expect to hear from God, and we are suspicious of those who claim to hear His voice.  But Jesus promised us, "My sheep know my Voice, and they will not follow another."  If we have not heard His Voice, we have not entered His Presence, and we do not know Him.  How sad, for we are indeed, "like sheep without a Shepherd."